


'til our throats are sore

by abyssalgreen



Category: Glee
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-03-18
Updated: 2014-03-31
Packaged: 2018-01-16 05:43:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 10,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1334197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abyssalgreen/pseuds/abyssalgreen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sebastian catches a Kurt-Elliott performance in NY and finds himself intrigued by Kurt and his rockstar double life. (Written for <a href="http://glee-kink-meme.livejournal.com/48822.html?thread=62157750#t62157750">this GKM prompt</a>.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> **Warnings** for: effeminophobia, some casual ableist language, a scene that could be read as sexual harassment, and Sebastian generally being an asshole.

_i._

It isn’t until Sebastian is about sixteen gulps into his second scalding-hot cup of coffee that he notices him. Kurt _fucking_ Hummel, sitting stiff and saintly just a few tables away, sketchpad propped against his lap and a steaming mug of something -- something sickly sweet and barely caffeinated like a seven-pump white mocha, Sebastian bets -- in his hand. 

Kurt fuckass Hummel, sitting straight-backed and fresh-faced like Sebastian _didn’t_ see him scantily wrapped in black leather and gyrating against a steel stripper pole onstage just a couple of fucking nights ago, mouth practically fellating the microphone in his hand. 

Granted, Sebastian had been too fixated on finding some sad desperate eyelinered twink to stick his dick into to pay the events onstage much attention, but he knew that delicate face and screeching singing voice when he encountered it. _Huh_ , he’d mumbled aloud to himself, _Kurt Hummel_. The thought was headed somewhere, surely, but was (blessedly) cut short by a groping pair of hands on his hips and the coquettish attentions of some tragic, swaying groupie. _Perfect_ , Sebastian had thought, ending the fumbling courtship after a few brief moments to drag the newly available body to the nearest bathroom stall, hand already working on his zipper.

If he’d _happened_ to come just seconds after the sound of Kurt hitting a climactic, guttural, reverberating note over the speaker, well, the events were entirely unrelated. And it certainly had _nothing_ to do with Sebastian’s sudden interest in him now, after a couple of years of consistently ignoring his presence when he’d been unfortunate enough to happen across it at a coffee shop (like today) or bar. No, it was just that Kurt was sitting there like an ascetic portrait of self-containment when Sebastian now _knew_ he apparently had little reservation about rubbing his leather-clad ass against things, people; stripper poles and giant glittery men. It’s the lie of it all that pisses him off. The frailty. But it's the lie of it also that gives him some power over Kurt now. He _knows_ something that Kurt doesn't know he knows. He feels like he's seeing right through him; seeing through fears, insecurities, and carefully-constructed masks: it's high school and the Lima Bean all over again. 

He doesn’t realize how intensely he’s staring until Kurt looks away from the pad in front of him and straight up at Sebastian. There’s a brief moment of charged eye contact, and it’s...weird. Unexpectedly weird. So weird that Sebastian breaks and looks away, immediately regretting his weakness but thankful nonetheless for the momentary reprieve it grants him from Kurt’s cold, unreadable eyes. 

He wonders if Kurt’s eyes are still on him. The thing about this New York Kurt Hummel is that it’s been relatively easy to judge him from a disconnected distance these past couple of years, but the second he gets even an inkling that the gaze and its accompanying judgement is reciprocal rather than merely one-sided, he goes a little clammy all over. It’s not that he fears Kurt Hummel. (Please.) It’s just that they’d left high school with so little resolution between the two of them and Sebastian has no idea what to even make of his existence as a person who still somehow silently figures into his life. Sebastian doesn’t do well with people he can’t make immediate sense of. Kurt had been easy in high school. Entertaining, defensive, terrified, with his cards shamelessly laid out on the table. This was not really the case anymore.

The overwrought antics of Kurt's performing self had changed that for a blissful moment, but now they’d just made eye contact and Sebastian had broken first. He had broken first, and Kurt was surely feeling fucking smug and pleased with his annoying ass self, and Sebastian had to fix this immediately. 

He glances up again, cautiously. Kurt has resumed staring down at whatever is so fucking intriguing about the sketchpad in front of him. Sebastian is pretty sure he isn’t imagining the faint trace of self-satisfaction tipping Kurt’s mouth just slightly upward. A scorching wave of fury boils up to his chest. This will not do.

Sebastian ponders his options. He could just go up to him, sit down. Make some snide remark like they never even left high school, like they were still hateful teens with Blaine fuckass Anderson and show choir competitions to squabble over. Kurt definitely wouldn’t expect it, not after all this time spent ignoring each other. The shock of it all would surely eliminate any feelings of self-congratulation he was mistakenly enjoying.

Or. He could go up and feign friendliness. It might not even be that difficult. He’d sort of apologized for all that nastiness back in high school. He’d helped Blaine with that mawkish, overblown proposal back at Dalton, had he not? And when he’d fooled around with Blaine just a couple of weeks after his and Kurt’s _second_ public breakup, he decidedly had _not_ called Kurt up to gloat about it (and he had thought seriously about it.) 

It would be fine. They’d have one faux-friendly conversation, laced with implicit disdain and mutual antagonism, and then Kurt could forget about the entire eye contact debacle. He’d forget about Sebastian’s momentary weakness, lose that insufferable smug twist to his lip, they could go back to happily ignoring each other. And Sebastian would definitely never, ever think about the leather or the eyeliner or that god-forsaken raspy note ever again. It was all fake anyway. Pathetic. 

The decision has been made. He picks his mug up and walks over to Kurt’s table, sitting down in the chair in front of him with as much pompousness as he can physically muster. 

Kurt looks up, eyes cold as ever. From this close Sebastian can see that his shirt has tiny zebras printed all across the white fabric of it. Fucking zebras, of all things. This fucking guy. 

“Sebastian,” Kurt remarks drily. 

Damn it. He wasn’t supposed to speak first. If he hadn’t been wearing that dumbass, needlessly distracting shirt, this wouldn’t have happened. Sebastian feels rage again, makes the snap judgement call to go back to his original plan: complete and utter snideness.

“Ugh, god. Give me a second. My hearing needs to readjust to that high-pitched, womanly trill of your voice. I’d nearly forgotten.”

“So. What’s changed?” Kurt’s voice sounds clipped, dismissive. He doesn’t even react to Sebastian’s insult, face slack and _bored_ , even. Maybe Sebastian can just kill him. That’ll surely fix the problem as good as any of the other clearly harebrained plots he concocted. 

“What do you mean, ‘what’s changed’?” Sebastian considers affixing another insult to the question, but decides to let Kurt speak again first, hating himself immediately. Ugh. How did Kurt end up being the one to establish the tone and terms of this conversation, anyway? Goddamn him and his irksome voice and emotionless face and that fucking _monstrous_ shirt.

“I was really enjoying the lovely agreement we’d silently come to. You know, pretending to never notice or recognize each other. It’s been a truly paradisal couple of years. But then today I catch you staring over at me like a frenzied lunatic. And now...here you are. Desperately trying to cover over the deranged bout of thirst that had you so fixated on me just a few moments ago with the same weak insults that were pathetic in high school and are only sadder now. What do you want?”

If there was one thing Sebastian _had_ genuinely forgotten, it was how sharp Kurt could be. It had startled him during that first conversation they’d had alone at the Lima Bean all those years ago -- _I don’t like you_ \-- and it startled him now. He was determined to find his footing in this conversation, though. No prissy little fuck in a fucking woman’s zebra print blouse was going to get any kind of leg up over him. Especially not one who has to costume himself in the painfully obvious trappings of leather and eyeliner under the cloak of night to convince the world he's even remotely fuckable. 

He needs to switch up his attack plan. Sexual intimidation has worked well for Sebastian in the past. It had certainly worked on Blaine. He suspects it’ll fare well here, too. Sebastian very much doubts Kurt is used to being lewdly propositioned, not with _that_ face, and there’s no way in hell he’ll accept or reciprocate. He’ll be disgusted, scandalized; violated, even. He’ll go out of his way to avoid Sebastian for the remainder of his miserable time in this stinking city. Sebastian’s life will resume simplicity once more.

Sebastian just has to get through it without openly gagging at the mere thought of his dick going anywhere near Kurt Hummel’s ice-cold asshole. 

Sebastian drops his voice to a low growl, equal parts threatening and seductive. “I saw your little show a couple of nights ago. The leather, the stripper pole...I didn’t think you had it in you. I haven’t been able to stop thinking about it. Those thighs wrapped around my face and my hips...legs and ass spread open for me...”

To Sebastian’s credit, Kurt does look completely and utterly taken aback, mug dropping with a soft thud onto the table. Sebastian feels a joyous rush of triumph-induced adrenaline. 

Sebastian relishes the moment, watching Kurt’s mouth softly fall open -- and that’s when everything really, truly goes to shit.

“Wait. What the fuck is that, Hummel?”

Kurt’s features shift from pink-faced, open-mouthed surprise to utter bewilderment. “...Excuse me?”

“On your tongue. Is that...”

“Oh,” Kurt breathes. He looks a little frightened but Sebastian suddenly feels no pleasure in it, _at all_ , because he definitely saw something metal glinting in his mouth and _oh god_ he just cannot deal with the reality of what that could mean. “It’s, um. A tongue piercing.” 

Sebastian despairs. 

He can deal with the Kurt who wears ghastly zebra print blouses and whose clever savageries are undercut by the inherent gentleness of his soft, quiet voice. That Kurt is completely divorced from the leather-rocking, eyeliner-wearing Kurt he’d seen the other night. He can mock Kurt for his double life, judge him, inwardly cackle at the fact that Kurt’s only capable of oozing any kind of sex appeal by overhauling literally everything about himself onstage.

But an uptight Kurt who bears the trace of his performative alter-ego on him _always_ by way of a goddamn metal stud on his _tongue_ , of all places, is not a Kurt Sebastian feels equipped to deal with. It’s not someone he can understand, reduce, or manipulate. As a rule, Sebastian only interacts with people he can exploit and control. He can’t deal with uncertainty or unpredictability. He just can’t.

He’s been silent for several seconds now. Kurt is staring at him expectantly, making no effort to conceal the puzzlement etched across his face. At least it’s lost all sign of that sly superiority it’d picked up the moment Sebastian sat down. 

Sebastian needs to get the fuck out of here, he resolves. Fuck pride, fuck the game, fuck it all. He just needs to close the book on this nightmarish exchange and ensure another one never happens again. That tongue stud means trouble. 

“That’s fucking sickening, Hummel. Let’s forget this entire conversation happened. I have to get to class.”

It’s weak. Sebastian can’t even believe what an absolute fucking trainwreck this turned out to be. And over a tongue piercing, of all things. Sebastian is seriously considering the necessity of some kind of psychological treatment for himself. It seems the medicinal properties of dick and vodka have lessened considerably since high school. 

Kurt, meanwhile, looks more confused than ever, mouth still hanging open slightly. 

Sebastian finds the barest of comforts in his speechlessness -- at least they’re _both_ disoriented, confused, and utterly fucking useless to the other -- before gracefully standing up. “Well. Until never, hopefully,” he snarls unpleasantly, rushing away before Kurt has a chance to regain his wits.

He steps out into the cold, blood rushing in his ears. It’s fine. He just has to avoid ever initiating interaction of any kind with Kurt, ever. It can’t be that hard.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warnings** for: some (unspoken) slut-shaming and an unprotected blowjob. Also, the song Sebastian actually pays attention to Kurt singing is Amanda Palmer's [Do It With A Rockstar](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EN0guZwMYzI).

_ii._

Ignoring Kurt turns out to be even easier than Sebastian had anticipated. It seems Kurt was well and truly shaken by their cataclysmic coffee shop exchange, because Sebastian hasn’t seem him frequenting any of their usual shared haunts for well over a week now. This was good. This was _perfect_. Kurt was scared. He’d allowed Sebastian to dictate his whereabouts. Sebastian had won, despite it all. 

Sebastian gives the barista his most self-satisfied of smiles as he takes his comically large coffee to-go. He makes a point of passing by the now-empty table where he’d harassed Kurt all those days ago, smirk intensifying and skin positively _tingling_ with victory. Fuck Kurt Hummel and his sad, desperate tongue piercing. Like Sebastian gave a fuck. Kurt fucking Hummel, that bizarre, spectral presence that had quietly plagued his life in New York City all this time, had finally _fucked off_ , and Sebastian hasn’t felt this great since leaving Ohio.

So he isn’t entirely sure _why_ his eye is immediately drawn to a garishly bright flyer on the bulletin board by the exit advertising a show “Two Peaks” will be playing at some dingy gay club at 10 PM tonight. _Two Peaks_. Sebastian takes a moment to roll his eyes so violently his skull throbs with the effort of it before recalling that that was definitely the band name announced before Kurt and his freakishly tall duet partner had taken the stage a couple of weeks ago. 

He’s even _less_ sure why this moment of recollection inspires him to tear the flyer down with his free hand before crumbling it into his coat pocket. 

And if anyone were to ask him why he actually fucking found himself downing seven shots of vodka in quick succession at said dingy club 10 PM that night exactly, well...he’d just have to plead temporary insanity.

Sebastian quickly checks his phone before gliding toward the already-writhing mass of sweating bodies on the dance floor. He can feel the vodka oiling his limbs up, and he’d like to be grinding against a willing body before Kurt gets onstage. Sure enough, he’s immediately met by some dead-eyed, blonde-haired slip of a guy. _You’ll do_ , he thinks indifferently to himself, wrapping his hands around his bony waist just as the music dies down, the lights drop, and _Two Peaks_ \-- Sebastian scoffs into Dead-Eyed-Blondie’s neck -- appear onstage alongside a needlessly lofty introduction. They’re greeted with a gratingly loud group shriek and a flurry of excitement, which strikes Sebastian as wholly unmerited given that, as far as he could tell, they didn’t perform much in the way of actual fucking _original music_ , but whatever. He maneuvers his dancing partner, with little grace or gentleness, to ensure his own back is facing the stage, determined to treat Kurt’s performance with the same lazy apathy he had last time. 

The singing has started, something upbeat and bouncy and obnoxious as all fucking fuck. Sebastian grabs as close to a handful of Dead-Eyed-Blondie’s ass as he can manage, eager to get him on his knees and somewhere out of sight as quickly as he can. He’s suddenly conscious of just how close he is to the stage this time, how easy it would be for Kurt to spot him. After a blissful week of not having to worry about his gaze at all, he’s feeling that old unease crawling back over him, under his skin. 

“They’re so hot,” the braindead blonde fuck lisps against his ear with exactly the kind of hungry desperation Sebastian would expect from a human being sad enough to lust after Kurt Hummel, of all people. 

“I’d really prefer it if you didn’t talk,” he hisses back, rolling his hips aggressively against him and gnawing on his ear lobe with a little more force than strictly necessary. 

The moron giggles vapidly in response to that, like Sebastian was fucking kidding and it’s a joke they’re sharing or something. Sebastian’s irritation escalates so dramatically that he actually closes his eyes and focuses on the singing blaring through the speakers so he won’t say something to this imbecile that’ll kill his chances of getting his cock sucked.

He immediately recognizes Kurt’s voice, taking over from his duet partner as the tempo of the song slows down and the band playing behind them softens. 

_Do you wanna dance? Do you wanna fight? Do you wanna get drunk and stay the night? Do you wanna know all the things I do when I’m all alone and thinking about you?_

He rolls his eyes a little at the palpable lecherousness with which Kurt suggestively vocalizes the lyrics. Sebastian can practically _hear_ the exaggerated, rhythmless hip swivels that are accompanying it. Despite this, and despite himself, curiosity gets the better of him. He steers Dead-Eyed-Blondie over slightly to the side, hazarding a peek at the stage over his gaunt, exposed shoulder.

Kurt, it seems, has momentarily abandoned the overblown gyrating so central to his last performance. Instead, he’s sitting perched at the very edge of the stage, calves tucked beneath him and the black leather of his pants stretched tight against his thighs where they’re spread _obscenely_ wide. He’s springing his hips and torso up and down with a decadent slowness, like the stage has a cock that he’s lazily riding, eyes screwed shut as fluorescent blue stage lights bathe the pale skin of his face and bare chest in an almost-sinister glow. 

Of fucking course, the second Sebastian raises his head to stare more effectively, Kurt’s own eyes open, dazed out and vacant for the briefest of moments before spotting Sebastian where he’s standing just a few feet way, hand still cupping his soon-to-be-fucktoy’s ass. 

There’s a charged, prolonged moment between the two of them as Kurt pants into the microphone, quiet now that his impossibly loud bandmate is screeching solo lines somewhere on the other side of the stage. It’s that moment at the coffee shop all fucking over again, and there’s no way in fucking _hell_ Sebastian is going to be the one to look away first this time. The alcohol in his system and the slowly-hardening erection grinding against his hip is helping embolden him. He stares back at Kurt with as much _fuck you you pathetic little stage slut_ as his facial features can reasonably manage. Kurt himself remains as infuriatingly unreadable as ever, lips parted and eyes fiery with the rush of the moment. 

Kurt’s face goes suddenly playful, eyes twinkling and mouth pouting. This can mean nothing good.

And then, sure enough, with an actual goddamn wink, the fucker is slowly sticking his tongue out at Sebastian, piercing openly revealed on full, shameless display, flashing bright blue. 

Sebastian’s blood goes cold even as his dick finally stiffens against the hard hip it’s pressed up against. He doesn’t have a chance to react before Kurt is elegantly standing up without a second glance, rushing over to join his friend for the final chorus of the song.

Sebastian feels tense as a coiled spring. He’s rutting helplessly against this blonde random now, sweating and groaning and _oh god_ if he could only just --

“What was all that about? Do you know him?” That fucking lisping voice is in his ear again. Sebastian is _so_ beyond done with this entire night.

“Shut up. Follow me.”

Sebastian wraps his hand around his pinched upper arm, yanking him away from the direction of the stage toward the bathroom, or an exit, or _something_ , anywhere, the howling licks of a new song pounding in his ears as he pushes his way through the crowd of bodies surrounding them.

He catches sight of a bathroom sign -- _perfect_ \-- and stumbles his way in, shoving this undernourished little fuck into the stall nearest the entrance, pressing him against the wall and smashing their faces together without bothering to ensure the door behind them is locked or even fully closed. The mouth against his is sloppy and wet and he needs it on his cock, now, _fast_ , before he has a chance to focus on the sound of Kurt’s amplified singing voice filtering in through the door.

He fumbles with his zipper, pushes shoulders down, down, down and -- yes, _god_ , there it is, wet sucking heat he bucks frenziedly into, groaning and tugging at the sweat-damp mop of blonde hair jerking at his crotch. Sebastian gnaws on his lip and tries not to think about how spectacularly lackluster a blowjob this actually is, how utterly unimaginative and routine, how much it’d be improved by a little play or creativity or the novel feel of metal stroking up the underside of his cock...

Sebastian moans so loudly it alarms him. 

He’s drunk and desperate for relief and this mouth he’s pushing into is just so woefully inadequate, and somewhere past the door Kurt is hitting highpiercinghonestlyfuckingannoying notes _but_ he’s probably on his knees again, thighs spread and mouth so, so close to wrapping around the thick head of the mic in his hand, tongue stud still reflecting bright deep blue--

Sebastian’s coming so hard he’s seeing fucking _stars_. He gives no warning and would maybe feel bad about it if this dead-eyed dullard hadn’t been so incapable that he’d had to wander to the sickest darkest possible place to get himself off, and fucking Kurt’s still fucking distractingly shrieking and fuck fuck _fuck_ he can't stop grunting and he just came in under two minutes and this is honestly humiliating. 

Sebastian collapses against the wall behind him, panting and sweating all over. He looks down to where this guy’s face is staring at him expectantly, inches away from his now flaccid and shiny cock. Sebastian’s not a total asshole. Under normal circumstances he’d at least offer this guy a handjob before moving on, but nothing about this night has been normal or acceptable and he needs to flee, right the shit now.

He mumbles an incoherent apology, pulls his zipper up, and speeds off and out, sweat cooling in his dash to find the club exit and get the fuck out of here. Sebastian doesn’t have to look to know that Kurt is still onstage, though not currently singing, and he’s probably looking at him and probably knows he just got a lamentable quickie in a bathroom stall and Sebastian is furious with himself for showing up at all because now he’s right back where he was in that moment of aborted eye contact a week ago. 

Sebastian breathes in, breathes out. Forces himself to calm down and hovers by the exit for about sixteen seconds before he forces himself to turn around and _look_. 

Kurt, it turns out, isn’t looking at him at all. He’s currently on the far right side of the stage, shrugging on a leather jacket over bare skin as he watches his bandmate roaring out endless vocal runs with an encouraging smile on his face.

He’s not looking and probably hasn’t been in the minute or so it took Sebastian to reach the exit, and Sebastian isn’t at all sure why he feels crushing disappointment instead of uplifting relief. He pulls a cigarette from his pocket and steps outside, welcoming the stinging shock of the cold night air.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a short, introspection-heavy chapter. The next part with proper Kurt/Sebastian interaction should be up soon, I've already written a bit of it but it dawned on me that it made sense to cut this off here, so here we go.
> 
> Also: I put "10" chapters in the listing for aesthetic purposes because the alternative of the question mark was bugging me. It'll probably be longer than 10 chapters.
> 
> **Warnings** for: Brief mention of past Blaine/Sebastian (sexual; non-romantic.)

_iii._

Sebastian wakes up the next morning with a groan, head throbbing and stomach twisting agonizingly. He opens his eyes and is relieved, at least, to find himself in his own bed, alone and in a sleep-rumpled version of the outfit he’d worn the night before. 

His actual memory _of_ said night is blurry. He recalls bar hopping, orgasms, regret, and, most painfully of all, the razor-sharp image of Kurt Hummel’s studded tongue tauntingly poking out at him. 

_Ugh._

Sebastian checks his phone and notes with some relief that he’s slept through his morning class. No reason to leave bed for a few hours, then. He could just lay here and plot his next course of action.

This Kurt Hummel situation has gotten well and truly out of hand, Sebastian decides. Sebastian had been willing to write off his first Kurt-proximate orgasm as unfortunate coincidence, but he had lost the comfort of that conviction after the events of last night. 

Sebastian has always prided himself on his capacity to be unabashedly honest with himself. It’s what’s made him such an expert manipulator. He’s never wasted time deluding himself about what it is exactly that he wants, not since he was in elementary school and boys started turning his head the way he’d been told that girls were supposed to. Most people are so preoccupied with simultaneously ignoring and working out their own desires that they never cotton on to Sebastian’s own, the morons. 

So. He has to figure out this Kurt thing. His power over his surroundings depends on it.

It isn’t that he _wants_ him, exactly. Not in any immediately obvious way. Sebastian never wants _people_. He wants the _things_ they can provide him, be it pleasure, company, or general distraction, but the particulars of human subjectivities have always bored him.

It’s that fucking tongue stud, Sebastian knows. It’s come to represent this liminal space between the Kurt who wears colorful scarves over woman’s blouses and the Kurt who squeezes into skin-baring leather. Sebastian has seen that stud reflecting both the dim lighting of a New York coffee shop and the blue lights of a seedy gay club. He’s seen it positioned both above a mug of sugar and above a bare chest and jouncing hips. It’s opened up this abyssal void between a now seemingly endless string of _Kurts_ that makes him incomprehensible and thus ungraspable. 

Sebastian is determined to _grasp_. 

He momentarily considers the possibility of just letting himself stick his dick into Kurt’s mouth. Maybe really _feeling_ that piece of metal against his skin is all he needs to get over this (frankly ridiculous) fixation. Once it’s on his cock it’ll certainly lose all this symbolic signification Sebastian has burdened upon it. It’ll just be another part of another body, uninteresting and discardable.

There are at least couple of problems with this, though. The first and most obvious being that Kurt would probably be more willing to put his mouth on a subway toilet bowl than on Sebastian’s _anything_.

The second, and the more troubling, being that Sebastian actually isn’t very good at having sex with people he’s...had conversations with before. Sebastian is extremely comfortable with bodies, be they his own or other people’s. But something about bodies attached to personalities he’s become acquainted with _radically_ changes that for reasons he can’t quite articulate. 

He’d learned this the hard way with Blaine. Blaine had marked his first hookup that wasn’t with a stranger he’d met at a bar or club, and Sebastian had fought wave after wave of nausea as he'd watched Blaine peel layers of clothing off after an hour of small talk and catching up. 

In the end, he hadn’t been able to offer him anything more than a handjob, and nothing Blaine attempted managed to bring him to climax (a first for both of them.) It had been, well, fucking _terrible_ , and the openly wounded look in Blaine’s quiet stare as Sebastian kicked him out had actually sent Sebastian retching into his kitchen sink as soon as the door closed behind him. 

If Blaine (who, in all honesty, Sebastian found offensively simple and whom he’d managed to not listen to for the greater part of their conversation time together) had inspired such visceral reaction in Sebastian, he can’t even imagine what would happen with Kurt. Kurt, who he’s always kind of begrudgingly respected for his capacity to wittily feign confidence even in the face of Sebastian’s cruelest insults. Kurt, who he now has this bizarre wordless connection to, the nature of which has yet to be teased out by either of them. 

Sebastian shifts beneath his bed covers uncomfortably. No. Sex would not work at all. 

Maybe it’s the wordlessness of it all that’s the problem. Kurt only seems complicated and elusive because they’ve had exactly one brief conversation in the two years of being around one another New York has forced them into. 

Sebastian feels a rush of promise liven his body. He can do friendship; he’s done it before. He feels reasonably confident that getting to know Kurt is all he needs to put this newfound obsession behind him. Kurt is like a literary text he just hasn’t read in full yet. You can’t just read an excerpt of _Ulysses_ and expect it to make sense. Sometimes people are like that too. 

Not that Sebastian has ever actually read _Ulysses_. But he’s sure the metaphor stands. He just needs to face Kurt in all his undoubtedly tedious breadth and come to an understanding that will fill the lacuna of uncertainty that godforsaken piece of metal in his mouth opened up. It’ll be easy.

He’ll devote today to recovering from the full-body throb of his hangover, and then he’ll head to the usual coffee shop tomorrow morning. He has a strong suspicion that Kurt’s presence will make itself known again there after that knowing display with the tongue stud.

Sebastian rolls over and smirks into his pillow. Yes, this will be easy. It might even be _fun_.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Warnings** for: some implicit classism and some implicit slut-shaming. 
> 
> Also, (COSTUME SPOILER AHEAD): [this](http://25.media.tumblr.com/b8dcde123e3f6338880b1ed94ec43ce8/tumblr_n2lyix1sZa1sqmc2ro1_500.png) is the outfit I imagined Kurt to be wearing.

_iv._

Sebastian sits slumped in his chair, sipping lukewarm coffee and chewing on a bagel morosely. He’s been seated at this god-forsaken coffee shop for a solid forty minutes now, and there’s no sign of Kurt anywhere. He can’t remember now _why_ he’d felt so certain that Kurt would suddenly break his streak of absence to comply perfectly with Sebastian’s newly-hatched scheme, but. It seems he'd been wrong. 

Sebastian despairs. What if he never ran into Kurt outside of a club setting again? He’d _never_ get this inane mania out of this system. He’d be tormented by the phantom feel of a metal stud against his tongue, neck, cock for the remainder of his miserable life. 

_Not_ that he wants to have sex with Kurt Hummel, he reminds himself. That’s simply the form this irresolution would inevitably take. His sex life will be eternally ruined, sanity forever irretrievable. 

Once the clock hits 10 AM, he decides it’s time to give up the dream and attempt the reading for his bullshit English afternoon class. He reaches into the Gucci backpack he’d settled into the chair next to him and pulls out a book, some Shakespeare play or something. _Much Some Shit About Who Gives a Fuck_ , or whatever. 

He’s about ten pages in before he realizes he hasn’t actually comprehended any of it, eyes skimming over the words while his mind wanders...elsewhere. Well. Somewhere in particular. The same sad desolate place it’s been going far too fucking frequently recently. Sebastian groans loudly, turning to glare at a startled girl a table away to his right when she gasps in response. 

“Having trouble there, champ?” 

Every muscle in Sebastian’s body tenses. He turns his head slowly to the left and, yup, there he is. Kurt fucking Hummel. The fucking Ghost of Orgasms Past. Sebastian eyes him up and down with what he prays looks like utter disdain. 

Well. There are at least no animals printed on the fabric of his top today. Kurt is garbed in a partially plaid button-up that’s left open enough to reveal several inches of milk-white chest, and then bound _additionally_ in a black skin-tight vest that elegantly tapers in at the waist. Sebastian notes the broadness of his shoulders and wills himself not to have thoughts about them. 

The whole ensemble is somehow vaguely evocative of Kurt’s wanton stage wear, and Sebastian can tell by the puffed up way Kurt is carrying himself that this was intentional. He’s beginning to think that nothing this guy fucking says or does is without strategy. It pisses him off. 

Sebastian gives the length of Kurt’s body one last (judgmental, it’s _judgmental_ ) sweep before opening his mouth to respond. 

“Trouble? Not at all. I must have just _sensed_ your oppressive presence moments away from making itself known.” 

Kurt only drops a steaming mug onto the table in response, draping his bag over the same chair currently occupied by Sebastian’s own. He casually seats himself directly across Sebastian, the hint of a smirk lighting up his features.

Kurt eyes the book still in Sebastian’s hand, curious.

“Ah. _Much Ado About Nothing_. No wonder you’re struggling. Shakespeare’s language must be difficult for someone whose major linguistic points of reference come from Grindr.” 

Sebastian snorts. “I don’t think someone with an educational background so piteously lacking that they had no choice but to study _musical theatre_ is in any position to suggest...well, _anything_. To anyone ever, really.” 

Sebastian feels his muscles relax. Verbal sparring, he can handle. _This_ makes sense. It’s been almost a minute now and he hasn’t thought about the uses he could find for that tongue stud once!

Kurt simpers for a moment and Sebastian can already feel the force of the snide witticism to come, but then Kurt surprises him, biting his lip instead as his features soften.

“Look, Sebastian. Believe it or not, I’m actually here to...extend an olive branch.” 

Sebastian stays silent, unsure how to proceed from here. It intrigues him that Kurt seems to have assembled a game plan similar to his own. He wonders if Kurt had also spent the day before lying in bed, nursing a hangover while obsessing over Sebastian. He wonders how that metal stud felt inside his mouth as he did. ( _Damn it. Pull it together, Smythe._ ) 

Kurt resumes worrying at his lip with his teeth. It pleases Sebastian to know that he’s nervous. 

“Well, extend away, then.” Sebastian is careful to imbue his tone with smug amusement, gesturing toward Kurt with his hand in a manner that is simultaneously inviting and dismissive. This is going well. 

Kurt’s blue eyes flash with something that looks a lot like anger before he takes a deep breath and continues talking, voice determinedly steady. 

“We’re not in high school any more. We’re not on competing show choir teams.”

“That is correct,” Sebastian affirms flatly. He refuses to make this easy. Fuck him. 

“We’re not competing for the attention of any...sexual or romantic partners.”

Sebastian scoffs. “You say that like it’s in the realm of fathomable possibility. The men I set my sights on are so far out of your league you’d be lucky to be on the receiving end of so much as a sideways glance from one of them. Maybe if we both had our eyes on a lesbi--”

“Hmm, that’s funny, I seem to remember a certain Blaine Anderson who felt differently,” Kurt spits, eyes steely and cheeks flushed pink. 

Sebastian grins. “Oh, yes. Our good friend Blaine. How _is_ he doing? Last I heard, he’d cheated on you _again_ after you were idiotic enough to take him back after the first time. Tell me, how does it feel to be _that_ sexually inadequate? I can’t even imagine.” 

Kurt’s eyes narrow and his smirk twists so far up his face that he looks virtually unrecognizable. Not even onstage has Sebastian ever seen him look this demonic. 

“Oh, can’t you, though? Because last _I_ heard from Blaine, you’d shamefully kicked him out of your barren bachelor’s pad after displaying a crippling inability to, ah, what was it? Oh, yes: _perform_ effectively. Yikes.” 

Sebastian feels all the color go out of his face. His extremities go numb. He can feel his heartbeat in his throat. 

How the _fuck_ did Kurt even know about that? 

He knows there’s still some way to turn this around, to take Kurt’s comment and wield it against him somehow, but he can’t will his brain to do the mental gymnastics necessary. Not for the first time in Kurt’s presence, he’s overcome with the urgent desire to _flee_. 

Sebastian looks up at Kurt, who is staring at him in open-mouthed, misty-eyed shock. He knows he’s crossed a line, and the devastation and regret on his face somehow makes the whole situation about a centillion times worse. _Sebastian_ certainly wouldn’t have felt sorry if _he’d_ been the one who managed to get such a paralyzing thrust in. 

The pity painted across Kurt’s entire person makes his stomach turn. Kurt was sorry where Sebastian would not have been. This was asymmetrical, uneven. It had stopped making sense.

Sebastian licks his lips, and collects his bag from the chair where it’s lying under Kurt’s own. 

“Well, Kurt. Olive branch rejected. You can go ahead and shove it up your ass, assuming you can unclench long enough to fit it in.” 

Sebastian stands up gracefully, clinging desperately to the little dignity this entire fucking dynamic with Kurt has allowed him. 

He rushes to the exit, feeling hazy and disconnected, and doesn’t think about anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep trying to force them into friendship and they keep refusing me. Friendlier interactions are on the horizon, I promise. And then sexier ones.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't think this needs any additional warnings that haven't already been covered in previous chapters. Please let me know if you read and feel differently, though!

_v._

It’s been three days since his most recent Kurt debacle, and Sebastian is feeling _great_. 

Really. He is. The shock of Kurt’s final jab had propelled him into a dissociative state so aggressive it had successfully blunted the emotional effect of literally every life event that had followed it so far. 

Sebastian has never felt more productive or efficient. He’d done all of his reading for the next _two weeks_ of class. (Well, almost all of it. _Much Blah Blah About Fuck You_ had gone ignored. For obvious reasons.) He’d watched a full season of _Nip/Tuck_. He’d come inside _four_ different mouths, and not _one_ orgasm had been accompanied by nightmarish live rock music or unwanted visions. He’s cooked, and cleaned, and had boring conversations with neighbors and classmates. 

Sebastian is _fine_. This whole “Kurt Hummel” thing is starting to feel like a woolly, half-forgotten fever dream. With each assignment completed and each syllable uttered aloud to an acquaintance, the anesthetized distance between himself and the amorphous terror that has been the past couple of weeks grows and grows.

The one thing that wins out over self-honesty for Sebastian every time is self-preservation. So he Facebooks his way through his English class, hits “next” on his iPod when anything even remotely proximate to the rock genre comes on, and goes out of his way to find a route to campus that _doesn’t_ require him to pass by _the_ coffee shop. 

Everything is fine. Until there’s a knock at the door come 4:14 PM, and then suddenly it isn’t. 

Sebastian is sprawled on his couch in sweatpants and a green t-shirt when he hears it. He drops his four-pound Abnormal Psychology textbook onto his chest with a grumble and seriously considers pretending he’s not home. Seriously, just because his newly numbed-out liveliness had led to a few more conversations with neighbors than usual did not fucking mean they should feel comfortable knocking on his goddamn door at all hours of the day. What the fuck was wrong with people? 

There’s a knock again. Firmer, this time.

Sebastian groans, moves his textbook to the tidy coffee table next to him, and heads toward the door, scowling all the while. He bets it’s that flirty large-chested redhead from a couple of units over and is already wondering how best to casually drop a “ _by the way, I like dick_ ” into the inevitable conversation to come when he swings the door open and experiences what feels like _all his organs_ dropping. 

Because _of course_ there he fucking is, Sebastian can’t even believe he didn’t see it coming: Kurt fucking Hummel, clad in some tight red and blue catastrophe of an outfit, face uneasy and shoulders just slightly slumped. He looks newly pliable in a way that Sebastian is unaccustomed to, and Sebastian cannot even find proper mental expression to convey how fucking _sick_ he is of feeling _unaccustomed_ to this bright-eyed effete little _shit_. 

A flash of frustration sets the frosty numbness of the past few days completely and utterly _ablaze_.

“Are you actually fucking _serious_? What the fuck are you doing here?” His voice is harsh and dangerous and suddenly so fucking _tired_. He doesn’t give Kurt a chance to answer before continuing. “Most importantly, how do you even know where I live?” 

_WHO THE FUCK EVEN ARE YOU_ and _WHY WON’T YOU LEAVE ME ALONE_ and _WHY DOES THE SIGHT OF YOUR IDIOTIC FACE AND THE THOUGHT OF YOUR FILTHY TONGUE MAKE EVERYTHING SO JUMBLED AND IMPOSSIBLE_ are the questions he _wants_ to tack on to his interrogation, but bites back. 

Kurt inhales shakily, but doesn’t break eye contact. His gaze is as electric as it’s ever been, and Sebastian has never been more sure that Kurt is astutely fucking aware of how _insufficient_ that stare can make people feel. 

“Well,” Kurt begins, (and Sebastian glowers because he always forgets how gently yet aggressively _distinctive_ Kurt’s voice is until he’s hearing it), “Firstly, I _am_ serious. Earnest, somber, _grim_ , even.” 

Kurt’s mouth tips self-deprecatingly downward in a way that lesser humans would probably find endearing, but Sebastian remains stubbornly unmoved. 

Off Sebastian’s unmitigated lack of response, Kurt rearranges his features back to vaguely apologetic blankness, but charges forward, seemingly undeterred. 

“I’m here, as I’m sure you’ve already at least partially garnered, to apologize. Also, to return your book, which you abandoned in your frantic dash to get away from me.”

Kurt lightly taps the leather messenger bag against his hip, an impish quality shaping the timid action. His lower lip is sucked slightly under his teeth, and his eyes are glowing again. 

He’s behaving as if he’s seen into a future where Sebastian has already accepted his apology, like this is just an entertaining, if humbling, hoop for him to jump through before absolution is his. 

It’s almost a relief, really, how _genuinely_ annoying Sebastian is finding him right now.

“Yes, great. I will be needing that book back.” No jokes, no play. He isn’t falling into this black hole of a trap again.

Kurt’s face dims. He looks down and digs through his bag before pulling out the paperback book and handing it to Sebastian, eyes downcast. Sebastian grasps it and tosses it onto the floor behind him without taking his eyes off Kurt. He hopes he can feel it. 

“Well, about how I got your address--”

“Honestly, Hummel, I don’t actually care, just lea--”

“I got it from Blaine.” Sebastian can’t remember when Kurt looked up again, but his faux-submissiveness has finally dematerialized, eyes vivid. 

They both stand for a few tense moments. Breathing and blinking at each other.

Kurt breaks the silence first. Unsurprisingly. Or maybe surprisingly. Who fucking knows with this guy anymore.

“Since we’re talking about Blaine anyway--”

“For fuck’s sake, Kurt, that was the actual frailest segue I’ve ever borne witness to. And I regularly have conversations facilitated through _Grindr_ , as you so generously pointed out last time we spoke.” 

Kurt waves his hand dismissively. Sebastian sees red. 

“Whatever. Since we’re talking about Blaine anyway--”

“We’re not talking about Blaine. _You’re_ talking about Blaine. I don’t give a fl--” 

“You asked me how I knew where you lived! You had to have known the answer. You brought him up indirectly.”

“Are you fucking o--”

He stops abruptly at the sight of his redheaded neighbor scurrying past behind Kurt where he’s still standing in the hallway, her blonde-red eyebrows raising at the volume of Sebastian’s voice and the obscenities littering it. 

Sebastian barks a rough, pointed _hello_ in her direction and waits for her to vanish into her home before refocusing his attentions on the insufferable fuck hovering in his doorway. 

His neck hasn’t even finished turning yet when the aforementioned insufferable fuck opens his big fucking insufferable mouth again.

“Sebastian, I want to grovel. Please, just let me grovel. There’s no pride or dignity in what I’m aiming to do here, you’re going to love it.”

Kurt has dropped the kittenish timidity, shoulders straightening and chest puffing out. He’s determined, it seems, to at the very least be brazen in this alleged dismantling of his own pride now that Sebastian hasn’t responded to his initial efforts. 

Sebastian sighs.

“Fine. Come inside, before another one of my neighbors passes by and calls the cops on me for suspected domestic assault.”

Sebastian moves to the side and gives Kurt space to enter, closing the door behind him and wondering vaguely what the fuck he’s thinking, allowing Kurt Hummel into his _home_. The small part of him that has spent the past three days buried beneath layers of benumbed rime knows that he needs to face Kurt head-on, but it’s a minuscule part. Sebastian doesn’t know how or why it’s currently winning. He doesn’t know when self-preservation stopped being his top priority. 

Sebastian turns to see Kurt standing awkwardly in the middle of his living room, arms wrapped around himself and eyes scanning his immaculate surroundings. The boldness of his colorful eyesore of an outfit contrasts strangely against the muted creams and earthy grays composing his current backdrop. He looks small and comically out of place. Sebastian already feels more comfortable, and tries not to think about whether or not that too was a calculated move on Kurt’s part. 

Sebastian speaks first.

“Well, I was promised groveling, Mademoiselle Hummel.”

Kurt smiles wryly and drops an arm to better fiddle with the buckle of his messenger bag. He seems a little off-put by the fact that he’s been left standing a solid four feet away from a Sebastian who is making no move to step closer or make them more physically comfortable. He adapts quickly, though. 

“Yes, you were. Okay,” he sighs and continues, eyes fluttering closed, “I’m sorry, Sebastian. It was a cruel, stupid thing to say. It wasn’t even clever, and if I hadn’t felt so threatened in the moment I never would have resorted to something so lazy to shut you up.”

Kurt quiets, looking down, but Sebastian can see a flourish of prolonged intent building in the rise and fall of his chest, so he waits for him to continue. 

“There’s just been all this weirdness between us, for _years_ now, first with Blaine and regionals and the rock salt slushee and then you were at my proposal like nothing happened _and then_ there were a couple of years here in New York where I legitimately thought maybe you didn’t even recognize me because we were constantly running into each other and you _never said anything_ or even really looked at me, and then you _sexually proposition_ me one day out of the blue before disappearing again -- seriously, what was that even _about_ \-- and then I stuck my tongue out at you during the _one song_ of my show set you showed up for before dragging your probably underaged plaything into a bathroom and disappearing again.”

It’s a rambling, near-incoherent stream-of-consciousness-induced mess, and Kurt is practically panting with the effort of getting it all out in what seemed like a single breath. He’s fixed on Sebastian’s face again finally, face and neck ruddy. He has the startled and expectant look on his face of someone who has made a ruinous surrender. 

He keeps going, though. He seems suddenly even less concerned with self-preservation than Sebastian is. Sebastian can’t decide if that makes him feel more or less comfortable. 

“And you just have this _snake-like_ way of looking at me that makes me feel like the same terrified virginal _child_ that I was in high school. Like I’m still sitting off to the side sucking on a Shirley Temple with _extra cherries_ while you gallivant around somehow both ignoring me and taking sick, palpable pleasure in the pitiable state of my presence.”

“Wow,” is all Sebastian can think to say in response, because this is a lot, it’s _so much_ , and he’s unexpectedly reminded of the queasiness of watching Blaine strip all his clothing off. 

“Hold on. Just let me finish. There’s always been something about you that makes me want to...break my own rules. I have a strict no-violence philosophy, I always have, and after that slushee incident you made me want to abandon it. And then, a few days ago, I finally did. There was...violence in that moment, even if it wasn’t physical violence, and I’m sorry.”

Sebastian’s chest feels tight. Kurt finally looks like he’s finished, eyes wild and shoulders squared. Sebastian needs to talk. He needs to make this more manageable somehow.

“Fucking Christ, Kurt, there was no need for all that dampness. It’s not as if I didn’t provoke you.”

Kurt stares at him in some disbelief. 

“ _That’s_ all you’re going to say? _Really_?” 

“This isn’t your first conversation with me, what the fuck else were you expecting?”

Kurt doesn’t answer, he just continues staring at him, arms crossed stubbornly against his chest. 

Sebastian breathes out, frustrated. “Okay, fine. I...accept your apology, unneeded as it was.”

“ _Unneeded_? Please, Sebastian, you looked like I’d just slaughtered a childhood pet in front of you and wrapped its still-bleeding carcass around my neck in the middle of that coffee shop.”

“I never had any childhood pets.”

Kurt scoffs. “Of course you didn’t.”

Kurt is pale-faced and upright again, prideful as if he _hadn’t_ just ripped out his mushiest of blood-soaked innards and flung them at Sebastian’s feet. Sebastian is honestly kind of awed at how masterfully he blurs the boundaries between surrender and dominion. 

And _naturally_ he’s thinking about the fucking tongue piercing again. He feels suddenly giddy with the familiarity of that thought, giddy with the rush of seeing yet another foreign dimension to his one-time enemy, giddy with the...strangeness of this all. 

“Well, was that it?” Sebastian asks, because Kurt is starting to look a little restless again. 

Kurt fidgets for a moment before responding.

“I just...wanted to invite you to come to any of my and Elliott’s shows in the future. If you want. I printed out a schedule of where we’ll be and when for the next couple of weeks. It’s, um. Folded into the copy of _Much Ado About Nothing_ you lobbed onto the floor by the door.” 

Sebastian chuckles, which Kurt seems to take as a response, because he continues.

“You seemed, um...intrigued? By the other couple of shows you were at. And we usually get some kind of a backstage space, so you could...hang out with us, after, if you wanted. We even have...groupies sometimes.” 

Sebastian raises an eyebrow, surprised by both the invitation and this talk of groupies, and Kurt giggles, absurdly.

“Not that I -- that’s more Elliott’s thing. But I figure it’s probably yours as well. I don’t...necessarily approve, but it’s preferable to Grindr.”

“Ah. So is _that_ where you’ve been picking up all your Shakespeare?” 

“Oh _god_ , shut up,” Kurt’s laughing more fully now, and Sebastian realizes this is actually the first time he’s seen Kurt unguarded enough to genuinely laugh in his presence. It...well, it honestly makes his face go all scrunchy and look even _dumber_ , but they seem to have struck up a hesitant truce, so Sebastian keeps the remark he wants to make to himself. 

“Okay, well. I’m going to...go, then. I’ll see you around, maybe?”

Sebastian nods, vaguely. “Yeah, yeah. Maybe. You’ve enticed me with your promise of cock-hungry groupies.” 

“Ugh, god. And on that sordid note, farewell.” He shoots Sebastian a look that somehow manages to very clearly convey _I already regret this_ , but there’s a contented swing to his hips as he walks past Sebastian and toward the exit (not that Sebastian is paying attention to his hips.)

Sebastian laughs licentiously before closing the door behind him. 

He feels a little dizzy and exhilarated, the vague beginnings of nausea spiking up before ebbing away again as he breathes in and out.

He picks up the book he’d cast onto the floor, propping it open and running his hand over the neatly folded white page tucked within it. He sets it on the coffee table without opening it, and tries hopelessly not to think about what he’s gotten himself into.


	6. Chapter 6

_ vi._

When Sebastian finally caved and opened the ‘Two Peaks’ (ugh, this would all be so much easier if Kurt didn’t insist on being so _lame_ ) show schedule, he’d been surprised to see that Kurt had also included his phone number in neat black ink on the upper corner of the sheet.  

He sits on the cool tile of his floor, staring down at the row of numbers figured in cramped but delicate handwriting. He wonders vaguely what Kurt expected him to do with this. It seems, somehow, like a gesture even more substantial than the act of showing up at Sebastian’s door had been. Sebastian sees a dimension of newfound possibilities opening up in the bold, sure strokes of the _5_ s, _2_ s, _8_ s, and _0_ s -- he had Kurt’s number now, to do what he liked with. He could text him. He could call him at 4:26 AM if the mood struck him. He could ignore it all together, crumple the paper up and never think about it again.

The power this line of numbers has allotted him is at once intoxicatingly sizable and startlingly tenuous. What had Kurt expected when he’d made the decision to lay it down? What was he hoping for?  

It’s possible, of course, that he hadn’t had expectation or hope at all. He’d ripped himself open and laid himself bare before Sebastian just the afternoon before. It’s entirely possible Sebastian has simply invented this daunting persona of Kurt-the-Strategist. Maybe Kurt was exactly the vulnerable boy Sebastian had pinned him as in high school; nothing more, nothing less.  

But then Sebastian remembers the tongue stud, that piercing stare, and those cunning, disorienting shifts between coy relinquishment and shrewd authority, and he just _knows_ this is another test, a heightening of the stakes of this nameless game they’ve ensnared each other in. 

He has to text him. This much is clear. 

He’s been feeling bizarrely seduced by Kurt’s confession, by the way a move so tender-bellied had somehow been so straight-backed and defiant. He wonders if he should make a confession of his own. Nothing as excessive as Kurt’s own, of course.  

Growing weary of over-thinking this, he picks up his phone and punches Kurt’s number in. He stares blankly at the brightly-lit screen for a few moments before holding his breath, typing a sentence that’s been bouncing up against his skull since he went to sleep last night, and hitting _send_ without giving himself time to change his mind. 

_Sebastian (12:04 pm):_ I was never trying to blind you with that slushee. 

And, well. It was true. Sebastian had tried to apologize for that entire mess back in high school, but the fact that the slushee had ended up hitting Blaine had allowed Sebastian to direct the apology also to that easier, less contentious target. Neither Kurt nor Sebastian had ever forgotten who the intended mark had been, though. It had hung in the air between them like a ghost all this time, and Kurt’s bringing it up a couple of times in his long-winded broadside yesterday had made its existence all the more difficult to ignore. 

Sebastian wills himself not to regret everything when Kurt does’t immediately respond. 

He busies himself by taking a shower. He jerks off and very pointedly does _not_ think about Kurt.   

He takes his time toweling himself off before checking his phone again where he’d left it tossed onto his bed, heart pounding in his throat.  

Kurt had replied. Sebastian slips into a pair of sweatpants before opening the message and preparing a response. 

_Kurt (12:33 pm)_ : Is that an apology?  

_Sebastian (12:47 pm)_ : I suppose it could be read that way.  

_Kurt (12:48 pm)_ : Well. I’ll take it, then. 

_Kurt (12:50 pm)_ : I always kind of figured that was the case, anyway.  

_Sebastian (12:52 pm)_ : I maintain that it would have been harmless hilarity if Blaine hadn’t blocked it with his eye ball.  

_Kurt (12:54 pm)_ : The nerve. 

_Sebastian (12:59 pm)_ : So, to borrow a transition you yourself coined...speaking of Blaine, what’s the story there? 

_Kurt (1:11 pm)_ : Nice try. That is not a conversation I’m willing to have via text. 

_Kurt (1:13 pm)_ : Or at all with you, really. 

_Sebastian (1:14 pm)_ : Aren’t these the kinds of conversations friends have? 

_Kurt (1:15 pm)_ : Friends do, yes. 

Hm. So this isn’t friendship, then. Sebastian wants achingly to ask, _and what are we?_ , but he doubts Kurt has an answer. Truth be told, he’s starting to take some masochistic pleasure in Kurt’s refusal to make an easy kind of sense to him.  

_Sebastian (1:17 pm)_ : You wound me.  

_Kurt (1:17 pm)_ : Ha. Fear not, maybe we’ll get there.  

_Kurt (1:18 pm)_ : Anyway, I’m off to an eight-hour shift, so try not to feel too grief-stricken if you don’t hear from me.

_Sebastian (1:19 pm)_ : An eight-hour shift? Where do you work? 

_Kurt (1:22 pm)_ : The Spotlight Diner. 

_Sebastian (1:23 pm)_ : Ugh. Of course. 

_Kurt (1:23 pm)_ : I work at Vogue.com, too. :)

_Sebastian (1:24 pm)_ : I hate you. 

_Kurt (1:25 pm)_ : :)))))))))

Sebastian puts the phone down, lying back on his bed. The Spotlight Diner...he’d walked past it before, but had never ventured in. The promise of wide-eyed Broadway hopefuls singing at him as he chewed indigestible diner food had never struck him as an appealing one. 

The thought of _Kurt_ being one of those wide-eyed Broadway hopefuls, though, forced to wait on Sebastian in his place of work...well. _That_ was an appealing one. 

Sebastian considers his options. He has a class at 3:00 PM, but he could pass by the diner after that. If Kurt was working an eight-hour shift as he’d claimed, he’d still be there. 

And so Sebastian finds himself, at exactly 4:46 PM, entering the lightly populated Spotlight Diner. He takes a seat, looking around, and notices Kurt behind a counter, talking animatedly to a coworker. Kurt, it seems, is very bad at his job, because he hadn’t noticed the entrance of a customer. Sebastian stares determinedly in his direction, awaiting recognition. 

Sebastian isn’t exactly sure what he expects out of this particular encounter. Their more recent interactions have left him feeling perpetually suspended over something hazardous, though, and he feared going too long without concrete communication would cause him to lose the already-fragile grip that was keeping him from descending downward into the swirling black ravine Kurt had somehow opened up under his life. 

After a few more moments of prolonged gaping, Kurt finally takes notice of him, eyebrows raised as he practically _skips_ over to Sebastian’s booth. He sits down next to him with one leg propped onto the cushion between them, bent upward at the knee. 

“Sebastian! I had a feeling you’d come.”

He’s being...strangely warm for someone who had just a few hours ago pronounced them Not Friends, but Sebastian supposes he was probably bored and happy to have a distraction. The slack-jawed, vacant-eyed coworker he’d been talking to _had_ looked painfully banal. 

Kurt looks especially youthful in the black-and-red polo of his uniform. He’s close enough that Sebastian can detect the smell of artificial sugar wafting off of him, attributed at least in part to a thin, nearly imperceptible smudge of what looks like vanilla ice cream on the side of his nose. 

“There’s something on your nose,” Sebastian offers in reply, voice thick with amusement. Kurt is always so tightly coiled and immaculate, even the looseness of his ‘Two Peaks’ persona carefully pulled together with tidy, calculated precision; and yet here he is, with a splotch of sugary white sitting stubbornly on his clear skin. Ha.

Kurt, though, seems unbothered, impatiently rubbing it away with a hand. 

“Those grisly milkshake machines are _always_ exploding on us. I can’t believe this job has somehow ruined ice cream for me.”

“It hasn’t ruined the sensation of white matter spurting onto your face though, I hope.” 

Kurt looks momentarily surprised before laughing out loud, face going scrunchy and pink. 

“Hmm, no, I suppose it hasn’t.” 

He shoots Sebastian a filthy, close-mouthed smirk that’s _just_ overdone and blushy enough to keep Sebastian from getting flustered. But only barely. 

Is pretend-flirting a thing that they’re doing now? Sebastian worries about that. The partition between pretend-flirting and real-flirting was always dubious. That first, explicit sexual proposition Sebastian had flung at Kurt had been easy enough, but that had been pre-tongue-ring. Everything was blurrier now. 

It’s fine, Sebastian reasons. He can do this. It’s not like he _actually_ wanted to have sex with Kurt Hummel. He _didn’t_. This was all just weird and confusing. 

“That’s good to hear. What would become of your upscale, cultured groupies otherwise?”

“You really need to let that go.”

“Not likely, I’m excited to meet them.”

He doesn’t realize until after he’s said it that he’s pretty much confirmed he will be taking Kurt up on his offer of post-show hangouts. Kurt looks pleased, and Sebastian changes the subject before this moment has a chance to escalate any further. 

“Shouldn’t you be taking my order or something? I can’t believe you get paid to do this.” 

Kurt rolls his eyes and gets up, smoothing the apron wrapped around his slim hips down. 

“Fine. What do you want?” 

“I don’t know. What here is _least_ likely to give me cancer?”

“I’ve had a slice of cheesecake practically every shift since I’ve been working here, and I haven’t died yet, so.”

“I guess that will do,” Sebastian takes notice of a large party of people entering, and realizes the fun of the afternoon is probably over. “Make it to-go, please?”

Kurt nods and walks off without another word, returning quickly with a small foam container in one hand and a check in the other. He places both in front of Sebastian witha tight smile. 

Sebastian pulls a $20 bill from his wallet as he stands up, not bothering to pick up the take-out container. He slips the twenty into the back pocket of Kurt’s pants. 

“Keep the change,” he says with a wink. Kurt’s mouth is parted slightly, eyes just a fraction wider than they’d been a moment ago. 

Sebastian walks away before he has a chance to react, hands buried in his pockets and his ordered cheesecake left behind on the table. 

He thinks of the soft mound of Kurt’s ass against his hand, the piece of metal inside his pink mouth, and that smudge of ice cream on his nose. 

So. 

Maybe he wants to have sex with Kurt Hummel.

Whatever. 

His phone vibrates a few hours later with a new text from Kurt.

_Kurt (8:47 pm)_ : You left your cheesecake behind. I ate it. I’d thank you, but it was fair compensation for the trauma of feeling your weaselly hand against my ass. 

_Kurt (8:49 pm)_ : So, Two Peaks is playing tomorrow. Will I be seeing you? 

_Yes_ , Sebastian thinks, before turning his phone off without reply. 


End file.
